


Witnesses

by actualkoschei



Series: BadThingsHappenBingo [2]
Category: Watchmen - All Media Types
Genre: Character Study, Gen, Ghosts, Gore, Hallucinations, Split Personalities, What the hell is a canon timeline, but not really, kind of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-09
Updated: 2018-07-09
Packaged: 2019-06-07 15:26:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,276
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15222137
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/actualkoschei/pseuds/actualkoschei
Summary: The ghosts of the past, restless and angry. For the "Hallucinations" square on my BadThingsHappenBingo card.





	Witnesses

The rain drippled down, dreary and endless. Nite Owl raised a hand to wipe drips of water from his goggles and debated internally the feasibility of applying a water-repellent coating. He strains to listen for any sound, of fighting, of footsteps, and hears nothing. Nothing but what would be expected, the pattering of the rain, the sounds of passers-by distantly filtering from the main street, a door creaking in the wind. No sign of his partner, and it had been long enough with no sign that he was starting to wonder if he was supposed to be worrying. 

He did not have to wonder for much longer. Rorschach appeared at the end of the alley, stumbling in a way entirely like him, and Daniel's worry kicked into overdrive. It was all he could do not to run to him, to keep himself at a walk and not look quite as ridiculous on the off-chance that nothing was in fact all that wrong. 

Rorschach leant against a wall, and even under the mask Dan could tell he was breathing heavily. "Hey, buddy." He asked, carefully keeping his voice low and steady. Rorschach could be skittish at the best of times. "You good?"

Rorschach's had snapped up, and he looked at Dan like – well, Dan couldn't tell how he looked, having never seen his eyes, but he could make a guess from his body – like he had never seen him before. Like he thought him a threat.

Dan braced himself for a hit, to fight without hurting his partner, but none was forthcoming. Rorschach just stood and stared at him, and so Dan looked for words and spoke again. "What happened? Are you hurt?"

Rorschach shook his head. "...Daniel." He rasped, hesitant, like he had had to search for the name.

"Yes. It's me. What's going on?" 

But Rorschach's head had turned slightly, his eyeless gaze had moved from Daniel to something behind his left shoulder. 

Walter did not expect to see his mother standing behind Daniel's shoulder. She looked older than when he had seen her last, but not all that much different. Her hair still the same bright, brassy shade of red, and she wore black lingerie – stockings, bra, a garter and panties, underneath a semi-sheer fake silk robe. Most glaringly, there was a whole in her throat, blood dripping down her chin from her mouth, down over her half-bare breasts. He whimpered and tried to look away from her.

That was when she spoke. How could she speak, with her throat eaten away by chemicals, with her vocal cords half gone, her trachea glistening bloody and open? Yet she did. "Walter." Her voice sounded rough, but still recognizably hers, with that sickening slur of alcohol and rasp of cigarettes. "Look at me!" She snapped, and, helplessly, his eyes rose to meet her once more, the sick fear of a child about to be hit rising in him.  _Weak_ , he chided himself.

"Ungrateful child." She took a staggering step towards, and he whimpered, immediately ashamed of himself, and tried to move back.

"Go away!" And instead of her stopping, Nite Owl took a step away from him, and Walter looked at him in panic. "Not you!"

"Rorschach." Daniel spoke soothingly, in the way one might speak to a sick person, and it made Walter wince. "There's nobody here except us."

He shook his head, staring at his mother. "No." He said softly.

"Walking away from me again?" Sylvia wavered on her high heels. "Little bastard. This is your fault, you know. You abandoned me."

_I didn't have a choice_ , he didn't say. Turned his face away from her. Again.  _Got what she deserved_ , the voice in his head whispered, and it felt like a comfort. He walked away.

Daniel followed, but not fast enough. And he was not the only one. The woman was running when she crossed Walter's path. Not a woman, really. Little more than a girl, a little slip of a thing with dark hair and a sharp wife. The skirt of her dress billowed around her as she ran, staggered into the wall and stopped. Her breath comes in gurgling gasps. She was crying, and she is covered in blood. When she turns her head, he recognized her. The voice that was plastered on a thousand newspaper covers. 

He did not move any closer, as she raises her mangled fingers to try to cover her face. Does not want her to seem him.

But she did. Fixed him with a gaze far too firm and sharp for a dead woman. Her lips moved to speak, and though her voice should be quiet as a whisper with her mangled lungs, he could hear her nonetheless. "Are you only going to watch? Pretend – pretend you can change things, but you're no better than the rest.  _Watching_." 

"Have fought." He told her, like it would make a difference.

She laughed, humorless, choking on her own blood with a terrible gurgle. "You've done nothing. Don't take my word for it. Take  _hers_. You'll see her tonight." She crumbled to the ground and vanishes.

Walter startled slightly at the feel of a hand on his shoulder. "Daniel."

"Yeah, buddy. What's the matter with you?"

"Drugged." He reasoned. _Must be. Hallucinating._

"Right, makes sense. Come on, let's go back. You're no use right now, and I can't patrol and watch you at the same time." Words that should sting, but don't, any harshness blunted by the pure truth of them. 

So he allowed Daniel to lead him, back to Archie, back to his home. There were no more hallucinations for the moment. Maybe it is over, he thought, trying not to remember the warning. The faint nausea that started with the first hallucination, that he has been ignoring, was stronger now. He went to Daniel's guest room, to the bed he has stayed in many times. Locked the door and removed his mask and closed his eyes, curling up and hoping for sleep.

For a few hours, he got it. At first, he didn't realize what had woken him. And then he heard it again. A quiet sob, a child's sob. He opened his eyes, and he saw her. Standing by the bed.

She was small, no more than six years old, slender. Her hair was blonde and parted into pigtails. She wore a pink corduroy jumper-skirt over a white T-shirt. In her hand was a cellophane windmill, the sort that might be bought at a carnival. She was crying. Tears spill from her fear-widened blue eyes, making white streaks in the dirt on her cheeks, and there was blood. Blood running in streaks down her bare shins, blood on her small fingers, blood soaking the front of her dress with an ugly stain, bloody fingerprints on the smooth cellophane panels of her windmill.

"No." The strangled sound tears itself unbidden from Walter's throat. "Not  _you_." 

"I want to go home." She said, in her piping little-girl voice, tremulous from tears. "You said you were going to take me home." 

"Sorry." He said, arms wrapping around himself. "Sorry. Am sorry."

Her lips wobbled and she sobbed again. "It's dark where I am. You'll see it soon." Big words from a little girl, far too self-assured for her age. "You sent me here. You didn't save me."

Walter felt cold, down to his very bones, though the temperature in the room hadn't changed. The voice in his head had gone quiet, leaving him defenseless and alone. Alone with her. The ghost of his greatest failure. He shook his head. 

"You didn't save me." She repeated. "Didn't save anybody. Useless."


End file.
